Madison – Fundamentally Sound, an all-male student-run a cappella group at UW-Madison,  gained national recognition this week for an original arrangement of Radiohead’s “High and Dry” on their debut album Stratosphere.  The piece, written by recent alumnus Bret Fanshaw, was nominated for a Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award (CARA) for “Best Male Collegiate Arrangement” by the Contemporary A Cappella Society (CASA).  Each year, CASA receives submissions and judges a cappella groups from all around the world, including professional, collegiate, and high school groups.

“I honestly couldn’t believe it at first,” said Fanshaw, who graduated from UW in May 2009 with a B.A. in International Studies.  “We’ve all worked so hard to put this group together over the last 5 years, and it was truly incredible to see it pay off like that – especially on our very first album.”

Nationally, Fundamentally Sound was 1 of just 10 male collegiate groups and 1 of only 3 Midwestern collegiate groups nominated for a CARA this year.  Other male groups hailed from schools mostly on the East coast, such as the University of North Carolina, Brandeis University, Brown, and Clemson.  Among the nominees are recent American Idol contestant Anoop Desai for “Best Male Collegiate Solo” with the UNC Clef Hangers and the Tufts Beelzebubs, who received 4 nominations total and recently took second on NBC’s The Sing-Off, a nationally televised a cappella competition.

To see the full list of 2010 CARA nominees please visit http://www.casa.org/cara2010n

“Just to be recognized among some of the top groups and performers in the country is incredible for us,” said Michael Trevis, President of Fundamentally Sound and a student of film at UW. “It’s extremely flattering and makes me anxious to record again.”

Though this is Fundamentally Sound’s first CARA nomination, it is not UW-Madison’s first. Most recently, the UW MadHatters were nominated for “Best Male Collegiate Solo” for Mike Jurken’s performance on “I Believe” from their 2007 album Not for Credit.

Freddie Feldman of VOCOMOTION Studios in Skokie, IL worked with Fundamentally Sound to record, mix, and release Stratosphere, and is also a voting member of the Recording Academy (Grammys).

“Working on the Fundamentally Sound album was a pleasure. Unlike many collegiate a cappella groups, they know what they want and they smartly go about it,” said Feldman of FS.  “They also happen to be really cool guys, which makes it even more fun to work with them. It’s terrific to be recognized and they certainly deserve it.”

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Souper Bowl XIV

Madison, WI – This Saturday, February 6th, Fundamentally Sound will perform as part of Habitat for Humanity’s Souper Bowl XIV event held at Madison West High School. We are thrilled to be able to lend our voices to this, our first, Habitat for Humanity event! Though we are only performing from 7:00 PM to 7:50 PM, we encourage everyone to check out the entire event which will also feature appearances from Jessica Doyle and Bucky Badger and a performance from the UW Band.

Saturday, February 6th, 2010 at 7:00 PM

Madison West High School
30 Ash Street
Madison, WI 53726

FS performs at the 1st Annual Wisconsin A Cappella Showcase (02/08)

Madison, WI - Fundamentally Sound will perform alongside UW’s other three a cappella groups (MadHatters, Tangled up in Blue, and Redefined) at the 3rd Annual Wisconsin A Cappella Showcase. For the third consecutive year, all ticket proceeds will be given to charitable organizations. For the second consecutive year, the proceeds will be given to the American Cancer Society through UW’s Relay for Life event, held in April at the Shell in Madison.

Saturday, February 20th, 2010 at 7:30 PM

Wisconsin Union Theater
800 Langdon St.
Madison, WI 53706

We’ve been nominated for a Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award (CARA)! Bret Fanshaw’s arrangement of “High and Dry” from our debut studio album, Stratosphere, has been nominated for “Best Male Collegiate Arrangement.”

The other nominees are:

• Alexander Koutzoukis’ “All the  Love in the World” on Play the Game by Beelzebubs (Tufts)
• Erik Abi-Khattar’s “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout a Thing” on Breaking & Entering by Jabberwocks (Brown)
• Jonathan Mauney’s “Boondocks” on Twist by Clef Hangers (UNC)
• Noah Berg’s “Hallelujah” on Ca C’est Bon by Midnight Ramblers (University of Rochester)

These are all great tracks and we’re stoked that “High and Dry” is being considered alongside them! This is our first ever CARA nomination!

Due to a traffic collision involving three of our cars and inclement weather, Fundamentally Sound will not be performing at tonight’s International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella quarterfinal in East Lansing. Our apologies to Varsity Vocals, Capital Green, and Michigan State’s a cappella fans for any inconvenience this causes. We’d like to thank our fans for their support through this.

We are safe and sound and back in Madison. We’re in high spirits and expect to be back in action again soon!

We have a long drive to East Lansing today for our big ICCA Quarterfinal, so we’ll be leaving Madison within the hour. Be sure to check out our Facebook page and Twitter for continuing updates throughout the day and check back here tomorrow for a full recap of the competition.

Running the set at Morphy Hall in the Humanities building

Madison, WI - To practice for our upcoming International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella (ICCA) Quarterfinal this Saturday at Michigan State, we ran our 12-minute set at various places around campus last night: the Great Hall in the Wisconsin Union, Morphy Hall in the Mosse Humanities Building, and the main lounge at Chadbourne Residential College.

Running the set at Morphy

Peter and Joe at the Student Organization Fair

Madison, WI - We had a table at tonight’s Student Organization Fair at the Wisconsin Union. We spoke with students about the group. Our table was right across the way from our friends in Redefined, UW’s coed a cappella group.

Clips from Stratosphere are once again available through our website. Visit the newly revamped page for “Stratosphere” by clicking below and find out about where you can purchase our debut studio album:

Stratosphere

There is a new page with photos, info, and lyrics for the following song:

"Break Your Heart" by Barenaked Ladies